Personality,Life Situation,and Life Expectancy

ABSTRACT: This study explores demographic, medical, and psychological variables which appear to be related to survival in institutionalized elderly chronically ill patients. Patients who died within 12 months of an assessment procedure were compared with patients who were still alive over 12 months later. Those who died within the year tended to be younger and less religious, to have a somewhat poorer prognosis, greater cognitive impairment, lower life satisfaction, and higher scores on a suicide potential scale and on an observation checklist of indirectly self-destructive behaviors.     

The role of object-hypotheses in the organization of fragmented figures

The effect of an object-hypothesis on the organization of fragmented figures was investigated by varying instruction given prior to stimulus presentation. One group was uninformed as to the possibility of seeing a figure; a second group was instructed that it is possible to see a meaningful object; a third group was further instructed as to which class of object was presented. It was found that, in order to achieve organization of fragmented figures, the observer must have knowledge that a meaningful object may be integrated from the fragments. Knowledge of the class of object, while increasing the likelihood of recognition, does not significantly decrease search time.